


No More Shame, No More Fear, No More Dread

by disorientedscribbler



Series: Something Like a Prayer [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Darth Vader Lives, Dysfunctional Family, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Kylo Ren Needs a Hug, Skywalker Family Drama, Unnecessary POV switch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-02-23
Packaged: 2019-10-03 14:44:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17286044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disorientedscribbler/pseuds/disorientedscribbler
Summary: “Why send your distress beacon to the Fractured Empire then, young Jedi?” Surely Leia Organa would not have told him about her true parentage.“I’m no Jedi.” This was said with conviction but tasted guilty in the Force.Vader crossed his arms and waited.Ben looked away. “For protection.”A seemingly simple request, although it begged more questions. Was he requesting the protection of Darth Vader or his grandfather? Did he even know of their connection? Why had he and the others fled Luke’s protection? Why had the First Order boarded their ship?-------------------------------------------------------------------------Vader Lives AU where Ben Solo runs to Darth Vader instead of Snoke after his uncle tries to kill him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is inspired by a wonderful [comic](http://oldbolo.tumblr.com/post/171642280836/au-where-darth-vader-is-alive-and-ben-goes-to-him). Please be nice but honest if you leave a comment. This isn't beta'ed so let me know if you notice any defects. Thanks for reading!
> 
> Work title comes from a song by AJJ by the same name. As well as, lyrics from another song by AJJ called 'Small Red Boy'. Both are great songs and fit well with the overall story.

_ "Anger and pain are natural and part of growth. They give you focus. They make you strong."  _

_ -Darth Vader: Sith Lord (Backstories)  _

* * *

 

The boy was not what Vader had expected. Even though Sloane had given him a list of unhelpful traits when she informed him of the news. (“Human. Male. Seventeen standard years of age.  Black hair and brown eyes--”)

He hadn’t really been listening. He’d thought he had what he needed: Something had happened at Luke’s school on Lothal. The local authorities were using their status as a neutral territory to bar his people from investigating the specifics. Several of the students had escaped the planet. Their ship had been boarded by First Order troopers. They had sent a distress beacon straight to Vader’s star destroyer. His operatives had rescued two children. One of which was rushed to medical upon boarding Vader’s star destroyer. The others were either killed or kidnapped by the First Order troopers.

He also had the only fact that mattered to him: Luke’s whereabouts and condition were unknown.

Normally this whole situation would be beneath him, as the Emperor Internum of the Fractured Empire. But something about the rescued padawan disquieted Sloane and she’d requested his opinion. This was why Vader found Sloane useful. She seemed to always be on the periphery of importance. She was not a fortunate person by his measure; but the Force liked for her to bare witness.  

“He hasn’t given us a name yet,” she admitted “He’s skittish of us. But there must have been a reason he called us. He claims to be the one who sent out the beacon. He keyed in our code. Not the New Republic’s.”

“Proximity?” Vader ventured.

“Perhaps,” Sloane admitted with a frown, “but something about him is nagging at me. There's some familiarity in his looks I can’t place.”

The boy was pacing when Vader and Sloane entered the room. An officer had supplied him with a shock blanket--which was draped over his shoulders like a cape--and a thermos of caf, which he clutched between two large hands. He was tall, already of an adult size, and likely still growing if his ungainly joints were any indication. The way he balked when he saw Vader made him look more like a child. Fear erased all pretense.

Vader had to admit, Sloane’s assessment, that the boy’s looks were distressingly familiar, was spot on. But for the life of him he could not place how exactly they were familiar. Was it the length of his jaw? The slant of his mouth? The curve of his brow?  And who was the boy familiar to, that both Vader and Sloane knew enough to ponder at a familiarity?

No matter how he squinted at the boy from behind his mask the answer escaped him.

As with all answers that evaded his grasp, Vader queried the Force, which vibrated with displeasure. No doubt in reaction to Skywalker’s dead padawans. There would be no answers there.

No matter, he’d take them from the boy’s own mind while Sloane questioned him. He needn’t resort to interrogation techniques, not while the boy was cooperating. His shields shouldn’t be an obstacle for Vader. He was little more than a child, after all.

Sloane made perfunctory introductions and bade the boy to sit as she took a seat across from him. Vader remained standing, silently by the door, his thumbs hooked in his belt. The boy threw a quick glance to him before sitting and giving his attention to Sloane.

She asked the usual sort of questions and Vader tuned her out; reaching for the boy’s mind. He was met with no shields, whatsoever, nor any resistance of any kind. The effect of which could be likened to stepping off a ship and expecting a gangplank underneath your feet, only to fall several meters to the ground.

Which is just what Vader did, in a metaphorical sense; plunging farther into the boy's head than necessary.  

Vader saw a green saber and felt fear rise like bile. He saw flames and smelt smoke.  

The boy cringed and looked at Vader, who was hastily withdrawing behind his own shields.

In the space between the boy’s open mind and Vader’s shields, he heard singing.

The boy stared as Sloane’s questions were halted by his seemingly unusual behavior. Vader was sealed tightly behind his shields now.

Still, the boy looked and the Force sang.

Vader had paid a steep price for ignoring this particular tune once before. He would not make the same mistake twice.

He’d known of him, of course. In the general way one knows that the stars are distant suns but might not be able to name the exact system. His son, Luke, had a twin sister--he knew--who was Leia Organa--he gathered--who had been pregnant during the end of the Galactic Civil War. Ergo, Darth Vader had a grandchild.

Rather, Anakin Skywalker did.

Luke had rejected him as Darth Vader. Preferring a fabricated, dead Jedi for his father over the real and alive man he was currently.

Darth Vader had never been in a position to inquire after Leia Organa’s child. He recognized the damage he had wrought on that relationship long ago and had never attempted to reach out to her the way he had with Luke. It would have been futile.

He had wondered about her child.

Not often. But when he'd had a quiet moment. Usually when he had grounded on the soggy hell of Arkanis and he had to keep an eye on his joints for rust and on his suit for rot. Those days when he felt ancient.

He’d imagined a miniature Luke, regardless of gender. He could admit that now that he was face to face with the young man his operatives had rescued. His grandson had called them for help.

He’d made the mistake of ignoring the sweet song in the past. He knew better now. This was neither light nor dark.  It was fact made known through the Force.

He was not what Vader had expected, but he sang like kin in the Force.

As quickly as it started it stopped.

The Force was not a mourning vibration, nor a truthful song, not now that Vader had acted. It was still. A caution for Vader to tread lightly.

“Skywalker taught you how to shield your mind?”

“Yes.” His answer was quick and clear, however frightened he looked. With no shields in place there was no way he hadn’t heard the song. Although, he may not know its meaning, as Vader hadn’t so long ago.

“Use them.” Vader crossed his arms and waited. He would speak no more until the boy brought up his shields. There was no telling who could be watching through the boy’s eyes.  Vader had plenty of enemies--though few with competency in the Force--he wouldn’t be compromised by the naivety of a child.

After some time had passed Vader carefully checked the boy’s progress.  

His shields were up--gossamer thin and in alarming tatters, but layered and present.

“Excellent. Now, you will tell me your name.”

The boy hesitated.

“Allow me to clarify. I know _who_ you are.”

 _Mine_ . Vader wanted to claim him, but that had been his mistake with Luke (one of several); pushing too hard and in the wrong direction. He hadn’t known anything about his son as a person. He needed facts before he acted. He had another chance, he had learnt this lesson, he had heard the _joyful noise_ of the Force and he would listen.  

This time wouldn’t be like his failure with his daughter.

This time wouldn’t be like his past failures.

Vader allowed his breaths to cycle in order to calm himself.

“I know you’re the son of Senator Leia Organa. I do not know your name.”

There is power in a name. A dead man’s wife had told him that once.

“I’m Ben Solo.”

Vader clenched his fists.

How spiteful.

He remembered Padme spending every spare moment researching name meaning until she settled on two possibilities.

Luke, meaning light giving.

Leia, meaning child of the heavens.

The name ‘Ben Solo’ was a mockery to this memory.  

Vader had to use every trick in his arsenal to calm his anger.

It took several moments for Vader to think clearly, but finally his mind latched on to information that didn’t make him seeth.

“Solo? Not Organa?”

“It’s my father’s name,” Ben said, answering not just Vader’s spoken question but also the question of familiarity. He was the image of that cocksure captain who had ferried Leia around in those years. The knowledge that the smuggler had sired his grandson was disquieting, but not immediately anger inducing.

The brief segue had calmed him until he was feeling better able to hold the thread of their original conversation.

“Tell me what you know about me.”

Ben finally looked at him again despite the doubt Vader could feel creeping in on him; around the edges of the paranoid fear that he wore like a shroud. And Vader recalled the one trait he found redeemable about Captain Solo had been his courage.  

“You’re Darth Vader. You’re a powerful Sith Lord. Master Skywalker couldn’t kill you.”

Brief, simple facts. But they were not exactly the truth. Not actually untrue, either. Facts, strangely distorted. Luke _could_ have killed him; there had been ample opportunity for him to do so on the Second Death Star.

But that’s not what he had said, was it?

Master Skywalker...

“You purged the galaxy of Jedi,” Ben added, quietly, almost as an afterthought. An odd addition and it upended Vader’s train of thought.

“Why send your distress beacon to the Fractured Empire then, young Jedi?” Why would he come here? Surely Leia Organa would not have told him about her true parentage.  

“I’m no Jedi.” This was said with conviction but tasted guilty in the Force.

Vader crossed his arms and waited.

Ben looked away. “For protection.”

A seemingly simple request, although it begged more questions. Was he requesting the protection of Darth Vader or his grandfather? Did he even know of their connection? Why had he and the others fled Luke’s protection? Why had the First Order boarded their ship? What were those troopers’ orders?

“From whom?”  Vader settled on that. The boy looked so young, suddenly, draped in the shock blanket. There would be time for more personal questions when Sloane wasn’t watching.  

But Ben was clamming up. The sour stench of fear leaking through his gossamer shields.  Vader could power through them; take the answers as he’d intended earlier. But it occured to Vader that the state of his shields suggested someone already had.  

Instead, Vader found himself taking pity and offered him an obvious answer.

“The First Order?”

“Yes.”

Vader could sense the lie. There would be time later to dig into it. There was something else he needed to know now.

“What of Skywalker?”

Vader felt guilt and despair.

“He’s dead,” Ben told him; his gaze unfaltering. “I saw it happen.”

A green lightsaber. Smothering fear. Vader sensed no lie.

Sloane did not look happy when the table splintered. But her opinion mattered little to Vader at that moment.

“A grave mistake has been made by the First Order this day, Ben Solo,” he intoned, clenching his fist. Ben had jumped up at Vader’s outburst and hovered above the toppled chair; his shock blanket cape falling off one shoulder. Still confused, still frightened, but within Vader’s power to keep safe.

“I will find who is responsible,” Vader clenched his fist so there could be no mistake of his intentions. Ben looked less than reassured. If anything, he appeared to be more frightened. No matter, he could be brought to understand.

There was but one last order of business. “In the internum, you are granted my protection.  In return I expect details... I will also require you to change your name.”


	2. Chapter 2

Grief was known to Vader.  

A mother. A wife. A student. A teacher. A stomach rounded with possibilities. A son. A daughter. Some taken from him. Some gambled by him. All lost to him.  He had grieved them all.

Vader had found himself softening over the years.  It was distressing, but true. It had started with Luke and only gotten worse. Luke’s existence had been both a blessing and a curse in so many unforeseen ways. How could Darth Vader claim a son who claimed Anakin Skywalker instead?  It was irreconcilable.

_I am a Jedi. Like my father before me._

And so, Luke Skywalker was left with a dead Jedi for a father and Darth Vader was left bereft. Having killed his master for Skywalker’s son.  

And now Luke was gone.

Some time later Vader looked over the report sent to him by medical.  Ben had picked the name ‘Kylo Ren’ and his reports reflected that. It was, frankly, ridiculous. But Vader supposed he had put the boy on the spot.

Physically, Kylo was fine, aside from shock, a torn muscle in his right arm, a sprained ankle, and various deep tissue bruising.

The other child, however, had suffered extensive third degree burns as well as an amputated leg and a dislocated shoulder.  

Her leg wound was classified as ‘clean.’ A description that Vader found curious enough to investigate for himself.

By the time he made it to medical--several hours after meeting his grandson--information had been added to her medical records, no doubt supplied by Kylo. Zabarak, female, roughly eighteen standard years of age. Name Shi’ko Lome.

Her burns were localized to her left side; the side of the amputated leg. Which, Vader found both precise and cauterized. The medic in charge assured him it had been like that when she was brought in. They could do very little with the leg until she awoken and consented to prosthetics.

Realistically, either the girl had underwent hours of surgery with a med-droid before the attack, or the leg had been taken by a lightsaber. Vader found the former notion to be foolish and unworthy of exploration. Of course lightsabers were involved somehow. No matter how it contradicted Kylo’s shaky story.  

More distressing, still, the medic informed him that she had suggested a psychiatric evaluation for Kylo, for the trauma he had undoubtedly endured. Which Kylo had vehemently refused to take part in.

* * *

 

Vader allowed Kylo exactly twenty-four hours to recover. He was easy to monitor, in that time since he had access to only three rooms and the corridor that connected them. His room, a recreation room, and, at his request, a gymnasium.  He’d spent the day cycle in his room and most of the night in the gym. He visited the rec room sparingly and only to use the public terminal; where he looked up incongruous and inane topics such as: basic electronic engineering and hyperspace lane scientific theory.

Vader hadn’t intended to isolate the boy but keeping him out of the ship at large was necessary. Operatives who had access to the same rec room and gym knew of his presence there and that he was a guest to be treated with respect.

No, isolation hadn’t been Vader’s intent; Kylo does that all on his own. He left either room quickly in the event another person came in, and retreated to his quarters. He never tried to leave the corridor.

Vader went to him in the middle of the ship’s rest cycle. He found his grandson in the recreation room, standing beside a cleared off terminal, facing the door. Vader wondered if he had heard the footsteps echoing in the empty corridor or if he was monitoring Vader’s Force signature.

“I assume you are rested enough to continue our conversation,” Vader said noticing discoloration under Kylo’s eyes. Which Vader’s mask caused to appear as a darker shade of red than the rest of his face. It could be bruising, of course, but he hadn’t noticed it before.  

“Yes, Lord Vader,” Kylo answered, because what else could he say?

Kylo was on edge, of course. People usually were in Vader’s presence. Vader could only hope that time and familiarity would ease his grandson’s nerves.

He placed his hands behind his back and started to pace. “Let us discuss the Jedi.”

“Sir?”

“At our last meeting you claimed to not be one, why?”

“I--” Kylo appeared to attempt to swallow his unease and put his hands behind his back. Mirroring Vader. “That doesn’t have anything to do with the incident at the temple.”

Vader sensed no lies there. And a quick pass over Kylo’s mind assured Vader that his shields were still wisp thin, which would make outright lying to Vader difficult.

“Why would it? I am merely curious as to why a Force sensitive with no intention of being a Jedi would bother to live among them. Skywalker’s Jedi way is so very different from the Jedi who betrayed the Republic. However--”

“Not so different.” Kylo insisted.

“Oh?” Vader chose not to be annoyed at the interruption. He stopped his pacing to give Kylo his full attention. “And what do you know of the old Jedi Order?”

“I know official legislation allowed them more power than a religious sect ought to hold.”

“During the Clone War,” Vader allowed.

“At all,” Kylo disagreed.  “They were encouraged to induct citizens with a high midichlorian count and kept extensive records of those they couldn’t bring into the fold. They took children that parents didn’t understand and were ill equipped to handle, with the parents’ relieved consent. Yet, they never had an official point in their recruitment process where they confirmed with these individuals that they wished to continue on the course their parents had set them on. Of course, officially anyone could leave but did any of those people know how to live in the galaxy outside of the Jedi Order?”

Another oddly distorted truth. What was the New Republic teaching their children?

“How does this relate to your disavow of Skywalker’s Order?”

“I can’t disavow it when I’ve never taken vows. I wasn’t sent there to be a Jedi.  I was sent so Skywalker could treat me.”

“Treat you? He is no healer.” _Was._ He had forgotten.

Kylo hadn’t noticed the slip and trudged on. “My mother decided mine was a Force inflicted ailment.”

Vader was skeptical but he decided to play along. “And what is the nature of your ailment?”

“According to my mother?”

Vader nodded.

“Being insufferable.”

“This is no laughing matter.” Vader pointed at Kylo, close enough now to realize how tall the boy really was. Vader had had to crane down to speak to Luke or Leia but that wasn’t the case with Kylo. They were nearly of a height.  

Kylo grimaced and looked away.  Perhaps, realizing he’d gone too far.  “I don’t count myself a Jedi,” he said slowly, “because it wasn’t my choice. It was expected of me. Master Skywalker shouldn’t have wasted his time.” Vader noticed the slightest tremor in Kylo’s voice now.

“How did he die?”

Kylo’s shoulders hunched defensively. “The structure collapsed. There was a fire.”

All true but lacking substance. It wasn’t really an answer to Vader’s question but he would not continue on that vain for now. Not when his grandson’s guilt was palaple in the Force. Besides, Vader didn’t want to know, not really. He wasn’t ready.

“Did the student’s fight each other?” he asked instead, thinking of the Zabrak girl and knowing the answer before Kylo supplied it.

Kylo hesitated--thinking.

“It’s a simple question,” Vader reminded him.

Kylo swallowed and Vader felt dread weighing down the Force. “Yes.”

“You were involved in the fight?”

Kylo didn’t answer but his dread was suffocating. Vader amended his question. “You killed Skywalker’s students?”

The voicecoder was not good at picking up subtle inflections so the question came out sounding like an accusation and his grandson's downcast eyes told Vader that he took it as such, but he answered unflinchingly.

“There was a disagreement.” His voice was low and mournful. “But it was a fair fight. Some followed me.”

“And Skywalker allowed this to happen?”

“He was already dead.”

Vader let this information wash over him.

“You fought with lightsabers?”

“Yes.”

“Did my troopers take yours?”

“Yes.”

“That is a lie,” Vader crossed his arms. His troopers had not indicated any confiscated weapons in their report of that night. “What did you do with it?”

Kylo cringed and Vader realized that the boy hadn’t moved since Vader had entered the room. Perhaps he felt as though this was an interrogation. He would have to work to remedy that in their future conversations.  

“I suggested to them I was unarmed then hid it in my clothes.”

Mind tricks. A Jedi trick despite his claims. “Where is your weapon now?”

“Hidden in my room.”

“Retrieve it.”

Kylo looked at him beseechingly. “Are you confiscating it?”

“Of course.”

“It doesn’t work. It’s broken.”

Truth, but it mattered little.  “Then why keep it from the troopers?”

“It’s mine.” Kylo raised his chin stubbornly. “I need to fix it.”

The time spent researching electronic engineering made sense now but it was futile. “You don’t know how to fix it.”

Kylo worked his jaw like chewing over his next words.  “I don’t know if it can be fixed,” he finally admitted.

Vader cycled through a few breaths to think over his next words carefully. He intended to tell the boy about their relation someday but first Kylo needed to stop thinking of him as some kind of jailor. It would take work. “It was in our agreement that I protect you, was it not?”

“Yes, Lord Vader.”

“This is protection of a kind.” Vader talked over him as he tried to protest. “You will retrieve your saber and relinquish it into my care. You are untrained in its construction and therefore a threat to yourself and my ship if you attempt to reconstruct it alone in your room. If you do this without further complaint I will provide you with the tools necessary to fix it; including my guidance in doing so. I have broken many a saber in my lifetime, Kylo. I assure you we can fix it if we work together.”

Kylo nodded, either agreeing with Vader or acknowledging that further argument would be useless.

When Kylo returned with the saber Vader was surprised to see it in one piece. Shouldn’t a weapon that was being worked on be in pieces?

“Did you isolate the issue?” He asked before clipping it to his belt with his own saber.

Kylo hesitated before reaching into his pocket and pulling out a kyber crystal that he held out for Vader’s inspection.

Laying sadly on his grandson’s large palm was his kyber crystal, fractured.

“It cracked,” he answered, needlessly in a quiet voice. “Bled, too. Now it overheats the casing.”

“Did it bleed or crack first?” Vader asked.

Kylo looked at him askance. “Does it matter?”

Vader took a few calming breaths to keep himself from raging at Kylo. It was not the boy’s fault. A cracked crystal was not unheard of. But it was unacceptable in the most grievous of ways.

“This is salvageable,” Vader assured his grandson.

Vader had assumed that nothing about his grandchild's appearance broadcasted his mother’s lineage. Yet, his gaze when he glanced up at Vader’s words shocked him. Those entreating, sad, dark eyes. He had inherited his mother’s eyes. Padme’s eyes.

“It’s not ruined?” Kylo asked, confused but hopeful.

“No,” Vader answered plucking the crystal from Kylo’s hand. “It is different, but not ruined. I can teach you how to make it functional again.”

Vader wished Kylo didn't look so grateful. “Thank you.”

“I would like for you to tell me the whole of what happened on Lothal,” Vader said, to segue away from Kylo’s gratitude. His grandson’s shoulders sank.

“In exchange?”

“No, you misunderstand. This is not a condition. I will show you how to fix your saber, regardless.  I would, however, like you to consider being honest with me.”

Kylo set his jaw; stubborn again. “I’m generally honest.”

“But you do not say a great deal… Think about it.”


	3. Chapter 3

It had been four days since the incident and they’d heard nothing. No reports on the HoloNet. No entreaties from the New Republic. No frantic families. The Lothal government wouldn’t tell them anything. However, they did grant the Fractured Faction of the Former Galactic Empire clearance to investigate the site during the next cycle.

In the meantime, Vader helped Kylo with his saber.

“I’ve thought about it.” Kylo says as he’s soldering wires in his lightsaber. The casing is cracked open with the over wrought red crystal laying in the center like an exposed organ. Vader had drawn up detailed schematics based on an ancient Sith saber design that should keep the casing from overheating.  

Kylo had been mostly quiet up till then--giving short, curt answers to any of Vader’s questions and only asking questions that were pertinent to the task at hand. Keeping Vader’s attention on the saber, no doubt, so that it was unlikely Vader would pick up the thread of their conversation regarding the incident at Lothal. 

Vader didn’t understand Kylo’s reluctance to disclose the whole of the events that night at Luke’s Temple. Was he ashamed? He had killed his fellow students so it could only be natural but Vader was not one to judge him for that. Besides, Vader was not picking that emotion up in the Force. In fact, Kylo was unusually closed off. 

Although, Vader had gleaned a great deal from his grandchild during the last four days of lightsaber construction and light conversation, and he endeavored to let Kylo lead this encounter.  

“Thought about what, exactly?” Vader is supposedly supervising, but Kylo knew how to work the tools even if he didn’t understand the mechanics. He was good at following direction.

“Why you’re helping me.”

“I’ve told you why.”

“You’ve told me why you’re protecting me--for details. But not why you’re helping me fix the saber. My honesty wasn’t the motive--you said so. I’d imagine an emperor wouldn’t normally have the time for such things.”

“Internum Emperor.”

Kylo shrugs; keeping his eyes on his work. “Even so. I bet you don’t have a slew of Force sensitives to choose an apprentice from. Especially gifted ones.” 

Vader….had not actually considered that. But that is what this would have looked like, from the outside. Kylo must honestly not know of their relation, if that was his guess at Vader’s motives. 

“Do you consider yourself a gifted Force sensitive?” 

Kylo glanced up from his work and looked, if anything, a bit offended. Vader had noticed certain moods in his grandson. He was never naturally mild or calm the way a Jedi ought to be. He was usually overly emotional; careening from one state to the next and feeling so strongly that it showed plainly on his face and bled into the Force around him. 

Or he was completely closed off. Deflecting Vader’s questions with cool superiority. This state, Vader supposed was when Kylo felt must vulnerable. 

“You’ve never really seen me use the Force,” Kylo answered, defensively; looking away again.

Vader had learnt that when Kylo got into one of these moods he  _ could _ just wait it out. Kylo would shake it off by himself after a time.  _ Or _ he could get Kylo frustrated and save them both time. 

“I’ve seen your shields.”

“That’s different. Shielding is for the weak minded.” A bold statement. Spoken with the conviction of someone reciting adage. 

“And who told you that?” 

Kylo finally put down the soldering iron and tilted his chin up high, looking down his long nose at Vader. It was a haughty, derisive gesture. One that he would have taken offense to from anyone else for the sheer arrogance it required. With Kylo, however, the gesture came with recognition. He had seen Leia Organa make the same gesture several times. Particularly when she was feeling trapped.

“So you’re not trying to apprentice me?” He asked.

Blatant deflection. He didn’t wish to tell Vader who; but Vader wouldn’t be deterred. 

“I use shields, do you find me weak minded?”

The arrogance evaporated like mist. “No, Lord Vader.”

“It sounds to me as though you’ve been fed a line,” Vader told him. Kylo looked away but a nagging worry made Vader push more than was probably wise with Kylo. First the whisper thin shields and now this. “Someone means you harm. It is fortunate, indeed, that you are here now, under my protection.”

“Yes sir.” 

“You’ve kept your shields up since being here. I would notice if you hadn’t.”

“Yes.” 

“Why do so if it’s a indication of a weak mind?”

Kylo picked the soldering iron back up and bent over the saber, ready, it seemed, to get back to work.

“You asked me to,” he answered quietly, without looking up.

“And they are stronger for the practice.”

They worked in silence for a while before Vader checked his chrono and spoke again. “This is enough for now, I think. We have an appointment to make.”

Kylo looked disappointed but started packing the tools away nonetheless. “We?”

“We have permission from the Lothal governor to investigate the temple. I want you there.”

Kylo stilled. “You want me to go back.”

“Just for a while.” The Lothalians didn’t have to allow anyone representing a foreign government access to their planet but Sloane had talked them into two hours at the site. Vader could have always just gone; using brute force and disregard for authority. But the Lothalians had a reputation.  

Kylo followed him to the shuttle mulishly but he did follow.

* * *

Vader held no love for the planet of Lothal. It’s usefulness had been spent long ago and it had become nothing but a headache after. Kylo, it seemed, was of a similar opinion. He reeked of scorn and sat, brooding, the entire trip planetside.

Once at the temple, though, things changed. Vader made his way through the wreckage of charred wood toward the temple proper. Now a ruined husk. It wasn’t the first Jedi temple Lothal had harbored but Skywalker’s temple had suffered a more human end. And if it seemed to Vader all the more tragic because of it, well... 

Vader hadn’t anticipated the pain.

Luke’s temple would have been very pleasant. Of that Vader was sure. Bright and open, a place that even Padme could have adored. The Sith didn’t believe in an afterlife, but the Jedi did and Padme had. Perhaps the Force could be kind enough to allow mother and son to be together in death, since life had been stolen from them both too early.

He had allowed Kylo to wander off while he wasted time in his reverie.  He could sense him on the outskirts of the rubble. 

There were no bodies, Lothal authorities had allowed families and friends to come and claim them before they had allowed Imperial operatives planetside. The New Republic had likely sent representatives of their own.

“Mom’s been here,” Kylo murmured as Vader approached him. He’d been sifting through the charred remains of what had originally been a hut, his hands covered in soot.

Vader had assumed as much. It would make sense for Leia to take her brother home. She’d know what his last wishes had been. She’d give him rites.

She likely had a hand in hushing up the whole ordeal as well. Vader wondered what she believed happened to her son.

“How do you know?” Vader asked. 

Kylo turned quickly, his eyes wide, as if startled. 

“She--uh. She--” Kylo waved his hand above his head vaguely. “She leaves a...” Kylo paused. “An impression.”

“An impression?” 

Kylo dropped his eyes. “She also took a few things.” Something about Kylo was...off. Vader stood watching him curiously for a moment as his gaze shifted fretfully; flitting from rubble to Vader to the distance and on. Never lingering for long until something stopped it completely. Then he would stare at some seemingly inconsequential spot for a long, unblinking moment until he physically wretched his entire body away. Turned in a different direction, the process would begin anew. 

“There’s nothing here for me anymore,” Kylo whispered, seemingly to himself as he had now wandered away from Vader. Vader understood the feeling, although it saddened him to bare witness.

Vader opened himself up to the Force to get a feel for what had Kylo so on edge and felt...nothing out of the ordinary: fear, shock, pain, confusion. There was also the aftertastes of horror and betrayal that always lingered in the wake of tragedy.  And a hint of sad, stale resignation. 

“I cannot feel her,” Vader intoned, before he thought. But Kylo was too distracted to realize that there wouldn’t be a reason--that he knew of--for Vader to be intimately aware of Leia Organa’s Force presence.

“I--yes. No. Of course.” Kylo turned back to Vader, this time his gaze was steady, intense. He was sweating, Vader noticed, despite the drop in temperature as the sun began to set.  “Of course you can,” Kylo said before compressing his mouth into a tight, unhappy line.

“Tell me what it’s like then.”

Kylo immediately turned away; agitated again. He was quiet for so long that Vader assumed he wouldn’t answer. When he did speak, it was in a whisper that Vader wouldn’t have been able to pick up without the suits enhancements.

“Do you have a mother, Lord Vader?”

The audacity took Vader by surprise, and yet he could not deny her. Even now. “I did. She’s been dead for many years.” She died, Vader realized, when he had been around Kylo’s age. Which was an unusually humbling thought. From Vader’s side of the decades, Kylo seemed so young.

“Was she a kind mother? A good mother?”

“Yes.”

Kylo nodded and walked away. Vader followed, several paces behind.

“Are you implying that Leia Organa was not good or kind?”

Kylo wheeled on Vader, his eyes bright. “Of course not! Of course she was kind--the kindest! She did what she could...Then she did what needed to be done.”

“What was it she needed to do, Kylo?”

But Kylo was clutching his throat in both hands, his breath coming in short quick gasps.

“Kylo?”

“Her impression,” he cried, swaying where he stood. “It’s horror. It's horror surging out of you like bile that you swallow back so often that it sears you.” Kylo lost balance then and Vader uses the Force and the strength of his mechanical arms to keep the boy upright. He didn’t seem to realize that he’d nearly fell when he looked up at Vader with tears in his eyes. “She always had to swallow it back. To spare me.“

“We need to leave,” Vader commanded. “You are unwell.”

Kylo, having truly lost control now, hit Vader with the Force of his anguish. And Vader saw the truth, but he didn’t understand. So he put Kylo into a deep sleep and carried him away from that dreadful place. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thoughts? Comments? Concerns?


	4. Chapter 4

Medical advises Vader against questioning Kylo further so, while Kylo rests Vader meditates. It’s late when he’s roused from his meditation by the proximity of Kylo’s presence in the Force. Vader knows that he was not discharged from medical (he would have been informed). Kylo must have snuck out to seek Vader. 

He wants to be annoyed by Kylo’s second refusal of medical attention but what he saw in Kylo’s anguished mind on Lothal--what Kylo shoved onto him--has been weighing heavily on Vader’s mind. 

For the first time since his arrival Kylo seeks out Vader. For the first time Vader dreads a conversation with his grandson. He had meditated and wracked his mind for any answers besides the obvious.

He had asked for honesty from Kylo and he will have it now. Vader can see honesty in his eyes as he lets him into his personal quarters. 

The truth, Vader knows, is a burden.

He’s not ready.

Kylo doesn’t even wait for the door to finish closing before he’s unburdening himself of the truth.

“I killed Luke Skywalker.”

He could never be ready for this. 

Kylo had blocked Vader in the Force; his shields sealed up tight for once. Vader would have been proud of the progress Kylo had made on that technique in any other circumstance. Now it meant Vader would have to read Kylo in other ways. 

Kylo’s clenched fists were vibrating with how badly his whole body was trembling. The muscle tension said fear to Vader but Kylo’s eyes said otherwise.

Kylo was angry. 

“Tell me.”

“I never wanted to be a Jedi,” he says. “I wanted to be a pilot, like my father.”

_ I am a Jedi, like my father before me _

Vader had no fondness for General Solo but he had apparently fostered a great love of flight in Kylo. He appreciated that but there was a time and a place. 

“We have discussed this at length,” Vader reminded Kylo. Fighting down ire. “Even if we hadn’t I would have suspected as much.”

Kylo looked taken aback.“How?”

Vader looked at the young man, who was fully grown but still had so much to learn. Who was lost and angry. Justifiably so.

“Cracks in a kyber crystal don’t just happen, Kylo Ren. It’s not natural. They only fracture under pressure. Such as, under use at duress. It takes years. Disciplining oneself in the Force should not be undertaken by compulsion.”

“They thought it was for the best,” Kylo spat. “I was scaring them.”

That did catch Vader off guard. Leia Organa--a girl who had stood toe to toe with him on several occasions, always with a scathing quip rolling off her tongue--scared of her own child?

“You mean your mother was frightened for you.”

“I don’t.”

Vader crossed his arms and regarded Kylo. They were getting of track. Was Kylo trying to avoid talking about Luke again? No, he had come to Vader. Vader would follow the thread of conversation to see where Kylo was leading him.

“Why would she have cause to be frightened of you?”

“She recognized the darkness in me. She thought Luke could set me straight.” 

“When? When did she send you to him?”

“Eight years ago.”

Nine.  His grandson would have been nine years old when his daughter sent him away.  Just like-- No, it wasn’t the same. Shmi hadn’t had a choice, not really. It was the best she could do for her child from her chains. Leia was a rich and powerful woman of a victorious governing system. She had the means...but perhaps not the knowledge.  

Had she ever learnt the ways of the Force for herself? What could she do with a Force sensitive child?

_ More than this, _ Vader told himself, thinking of the cracked kyber. More than turn him away and hope for the best.

Kylo mistook his silence for doubt.

“It was him she felt. Not my own darkness--not then. When I tried to tell her that, it only made her more frightened. She claimed I could come home after I learnt control from Luke.”

“Him?”

“He’s always whispering. Sometimes the noise would make me lash out. Usually he would say things to undermined my parents or Master Skywalker. He’d keep me frustrated and angry with nightmares. I’ve tried blocking him out but--”

“Is this voice a manifestation of the Force or...?”  

Or a figment of your imagination?

Kylo seemed to latch on to the unspoken question. “No, nothing like that. He’s a real Force user. I’ve felt him. For as long as I can remember I’ve felt him come into my head as he pleases. It's such a dreadful thing, Lord Vader, when not even your thoughts are safe.”

“Does this specter have a name?”

“Snoke.”

The name ran through Vader like a blaster bolt. That was a name Vader knew all too well, and corroborated Kylo’s story better than any truth serum or mind probe. There should be no way Kylo had ever heard that name.

“Be calm, Kylo. I believe you.” Kylo relaxed. “Let us leave this topic for now. Tell me about Skywalker’s temple.”

To Vader’s utter horror, Kylo’s eyes filled with tears as he gazed up at him, beseechingly. “I was sleeping,” he started unexpectedly. “Luke, came into my hut while I was sleeping. I had told him about Snoke but he thought we had it under control. That night he looked inside my head. Whatever he saw--he.”

Kylo swallowed heavily and hateful tears spilled out of his eyes. "I will not be sorry for fighting back. For surviving. I shouldn’t--I can’t be sorry for that. He had his lightsaber raised above me when I woke. He would have killed me in my sleep if I hadn’t opened my eyes. I survived our confrontation...and I woke the others. I tried to explain myself.  Some of them--many of them--believed that if Luke saw fit to dispose of me then I was a threat to be cut down. They wanted to finish what he’d started.” Kylo’s breath was coming shallow and agitated. “I’ve always wanted to leave but I hadn’t wanted to go that far, they forced my hand. I only wanted--”

Quiet despite himself Vader had crossed the room to his grandchild and lay a durasteel hand on his shoulder the other on his head.  He didn’t have practice being comforting but he loomed over his grandson until he calmed. 

“I didn’t expect you to be sad.” Kylo is wary when he speaks, his voice thick from crying. Vader hadn’t realized that he was projecting. “You cared about him.” It’s not a question. It’s an accusation.

It’s time Vader met truth for truth.

“I do.” He had used the wrong tense again but he can’t find it in himself to correct his wording now. He didn’t stop caring just because Luke is gone, did he? “Although, not enough by his estimation. Perhaps not how I ought to.”

Kylo is still under Vader’s hands--tense. 

“What do you mean?”

“I have grown a greedy heart, Kylo.” It hadn’t always been that way, had it? “Though I try to mitigate it, my love is a possessive sort. My mother would be ashamed of me. My wife would be horrified by what I’ve done. My daughter hates me, for good reason. She and her brother have spent their lives building upon the ashes of what I destroyed.”

Vader took his hand off Kylo’s head and lay both on his grandson’s shoulders; looking into his eyes as much as he was able with the mask between them.

“These things hurt me, Kylo. Because I have loved these people--in my own selfish way. Meeting you and hearing your account makes me...lighter. Perhaps that is a cruel thing to say. But if my virtuous children can make all the wrong choices and raise a wretch, such as yourself, well...For the first time since I’ve known about them, Luke and Leia feel like  _ my _ children. Like they’ve inherited something of  _ me _ .”

It was a shameful truth. But it was the truth.

"Thank you, my grandson. Thank you for that.”

Kylo’s eyes were searching the mask; looking for the man underneath. “Anakin Skywalker died when the Republic fell.”

“No, Anakin Skywalker fell with the Republic. Because he listened to the lies of a vile man.”

“Snoke?”

“Snoke is a worm compared to Palpatine. But I will be damned before that worm is beset upon even the dead parts of you, Kylo.” The cycle of Vader’s family being preyed upon will end. He would make certain. “Have your thoughts been usurped by Snoke since you ran from the Temple?”

Kylo swallowed and looked away. “At first, he wouldn’t shut up--going on about how my parents wouldn't believe Luke had attacked me. That they’d brand me a murderer. That mother love--loved Luke more than me. He wanted me to come to him.”

“But you chose to come here.” Vader was suddenly grateful. Whether it was Kylo’s own choice or the will of the Force at work, it didn’t matter. Vader would thank anything and everything that events had lead to Kylo to him. It could have all been so different for Vader and Kylo. If Kylo had turned to Snoke it could have all been so much worse.

With Kylo here Vader could teach him. He hadn’t liked the idea at first but knowing that Kylo had killed Luke...It seemed fitting to shroud him in darkness. 

“You are the only one Luke couldn’t kill," he insisted. "I wasn’t sure, at first, if he was dead. If he wasn’t he would hunt me. But I haven’t felt him in the Force since that night. And since I’ve been here, Snoke’s been quiet. I’ve not heard a whisper from him since I set foot on this ship.”

“The Force is at work,” Vader intoned. “You belong here. At my side. I can teach you what you need to know to free yourself.”

Kylo swallows and concedes with a whispered: “I’ve called someone Master before.” 

Just like that Vader’s fantasy soured. Could he abide his grandchild calling him Master? Certainly not.

* * *

There are a great many things wrong with Kylo’s tale and chief among them were Luke’s actions. He himself had raised a saber against Ahsoka when they were on different sides of a Galactic conflict. But when he had been her Master? When she was in his care?

He couldn’t imagine Luke doing such a thing either. Not his bright, light Luke, who had discarded his saber in the face of his enemy. Had the years changed him into someone so unrecognizable, as they had to Vader?

No. Vader reminded himself with a mental shake. It wasn’t the wear of time that changed him. It was Palpatine. Palpatine and the thought of life without Padme. The thought of her loss looming so large over him that he’d sunk into the depths of the Dark Side like a stone. 

Did he regret it? Yes. But he had killed his master and his children would not have him and he had lived without Padme now for twice as long as he had known her. Why turn towards the Light when the pain was same as it was in the Dark? 

Luke had rejected the Dark in the face of loss and war and kinship. What of peace and prosperity could have changed him into a man who sought to kill family in their sleep?

Nothing. There was no conceivable way this version of Luke could be truth. Did that mean Kylo was lying to him? To what end? Moreover, Vader sensed no lie. Not even a whiff of a mincing of words. Kylo believed himself. Wholly and sadly and with terror in his eyes.

With the notion in mind to give Kylo time to adjust, Vader makes plans. Even so, it is clear that this grandson is avoiding him. It is baffling to Vader, this reluctance to embrace a family member that wanted to claim you. 

Still, Vader’s patience was not infinite and when his plans started to come together, he sent a summons to Kylo. He relayed the message that Kylo ought to bring his saber from Vader’s private workroom, where they had been reconstructing it. Vader has a mind to complete its construction and spar with his grandchild to test it. 

Kylo brings a finished product. Vader was disappointed. He had been looking forward to rebuilding the saber alongside his grandson.

"It works?"

Kylo nodded

He ignited the blade and Vader cringed. Surely, projecting his distaste through the Force. 

“You said it needed to vent,” Kylo pointed out, petulantly.

“Periodically.” Vader conceded. “Not continuously.”

“I tried that; it put too much strain on the crystal. At least this way it won’t blow up in my face.”

Vader disagreed. It was an inelegant design, Vader noted, when Kylo finally allowed him to inspect it for himself. It had been before the modifications, but Kylo had turned it into an ugly, monstrous thing. Painted black, with a single red wire left out of the casing, hastily stapled on the side. The struts for the cross-guard had been welded on--not the traditional method for Jedi. 

At least, Vader noticed with resignation, they were level with each other. At least, ignited, the weapon was perfectly balanced. At least that. 

So it was not how Vader would have done it. Nor was it like Luke’s, which Vader had inspected with pride on Endor so long ago. So what? What Kylo needed was encouragement. And a subtle, guiding hand. 

“It’s not my best work,” Kylo groused during Vader’s long pause. “It’s a work in progress.”

“It is functional,” Vader said, passing it back. “Continue your upgrades if you like, however, the appearance of the saber matters little in the face of how it is wielded. I assume Skywalker taught you the basics? Show me.”

Kylo fought to kill. He possessed none of the finesse of the Jedi of old, but none of their hesitation either. He fought to survive. And in this aspect, Vader was proud.

“Why did you not consult me with your saber repairs?” Vader asked when they had finished. Kylo is mullish, turning the monstrosity over in his hands.

“I like it here. It’s quiet.”

Vader begins to irk at the non-answer but Kylo’s moodiness was like a mirror. It was dangerous, looking at this young man and seeing another Jedi of a bygone era. One who felt rejected and therefore, refused to accept help from those he considered to be family. Who had turned, instead, to a perceived unbiased kindness. However, it would stand to reason that Kylo felt rejected by his family. After Leia sent him away...After Luke--

Was declaring their blood a wrong move on Vader’s part? Did Kylo feel uncertain of his place among yet another member of his family? Another familial legacy? What had Anakin Skywalker needed back then? What would have kept him from turning to Palpatine? What had Obi-Wan, Padme, and Ahsoka not been willing to give him? Did it help for him to speculate? 

“I don’t want you to regret taking me in.” It was said so quietly that Vader nearly missed it, lost in spiraling thoughts.

“Why would I do that?

Kylo looked at him, considering. Vader couldn’t know what he was looking for or what he found but when he spoke again it held the weight of truth. “I don’t know what you expect from me. Mom always said I could come home when I learnt control, but none of my training was ever enough for her to deem me controlled. And Luke…” Kylo swallowed and looked back down at his modified saber.

“Luke never gave me any indication he was ready to give up on me. I didn’t know he thought me irredeemable until the moment he tried to kill me.  _ I _ knew I was dangerously close to falling. But I feel like there were steps he could have taken, as my master, to mitigate...My track record indicates that I will be a disappointment to you.”

Vader let this knowledge settle over him. 

“What is it you expect from yourself?,” he asked finally. “You are not, after all, the sum of other people's plans. Nor, are you a child to be dictated.”

“From myself?” Kylo seemed truly baffled by the question.

Vader remained quiet; letting Kylo come to his own conclusion.

“I had just wanted to make them proud of me,” Kylo finally admitted. “They took that from me.”

“Snoke took it from you.”

Kylo shook his head. “All he did was make me wise to their hypocrisy.”

Vader wasn’t pleased with Kylo’s line of thinking but Kylo’s hurt was so deep seeded that is stung to feel even the echo of it in the Force. And Vader was at a loss. Here was a young man--his own flesh and blood--who so obviously needed  _ something _ but Vader was clueless as to what. Let alone how to give it to him. 

“Then let me be clear. I expect to give you the galaxy some day. I expect you to have the sense to take it.”

Kylo seemed to mull over this. “I think I’d like to not be helpless. You are right, I’m not a child. I could have left Luke’s Temple and struck out for myself. But I didn’t. I’d like to actually start making decisions for myself instead of just reacting.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not entirely happy with this chapter but here it is. This is where the 'unnecessary POV switch' tag comes in. The chapter switches back and forth between Vader and Kylo's POV.

The First Order was ruled by a being called Snoke. Vader had not met the creature in person. They had shared a few terse holo conferences. They had danced around each other’s Force presence. Vader knew Snoke was from unknown reaches of space. He knew he was immensely powerful in the Dark Side. He knew he was knowledgeable in ways Vader was not; cunning, patient, and ambitious. None of this mattered. All Vader needed to know about him was that he was mortal.

But still, there was Kylo to think about. Vader could feel the conflict radiating off of his grandchild when he detailed the mission for him. Unlike their trip to Lothal, Vader gave Kylo the choice to come or not.

Vader was careful to check his expectations when he asked Kylo to accompany him. He very much wanted this to be not only a moment of triumph for the Fractured Faction of the Former Galactic Empire--where he finally healed the schism--but for Kylo too. It was Snoke, after all, who had pushed him so brutally. 

Still, he was all too aware of the Kylo’s reservations. The amount of trust he’d have to place in Vader to follow him into Snoke’s territory was astounding. And why would Kylo easily trust Vader?

He was, after all, a monster.  

Even with his expectations in check Vader feels his heart leap for the first time in nearly twenty years when he enters the briefing room and sees his grandson there. Kylo is sitting far away from the Imperial operatives and is just as awkward and lanky and unsure as when Vader met him, but he’s present.

“Let us mend this fracture once and for all.” He addresses his operatives; they salute. 

Kylo looks wary. 

When the officers were scattered trying to get everything in order Vader approached Kylo. “I am pleased to see you here among us,” Vader said, placing a hand upon Kylo’s shoulder.

“I don’t know if I can kill him,” Kylo admitted quietly.  

“The decision is not yours,” Vader assured. “If you cannot, then I will. This is but an opportunity.”

* * *

There is a detailed plan for the mission that was drawn up by some officer with Vader’s approval. The officer briefs the troopers and Kylo on the specifics.

Officially the officers of the Fractured Faction are meeting with the First Order on a neutral planet to negotiate the release of however many of Skywalker’s students the First Order is holding hostage.

Unofficially, Vader and eight troopers are going to infiltrate Snoke’s flagship, _The_ _Supremacy_ , and destroy him by any means necessary.

Kylo is allowed to choose if he wants to go planetside with the officers to identify the hostages or join Vader on  _ The Supremacy. _

Vader. 

His grandfather.

_ Plans always change. Your goal won’t.  _ Kylo could practically hear Han saying this and sometimes remembering his parents rackled, but right now the reminder was comforting. 

Kylo’s goal is simple: rescue the others. He knew that Vader wanted him to help kill Snoke but that wasn’t Kylo’s goal. He needed to keep that and only that in mind.

_ I would have spared you the burden of this knowledge _ . 

Snoke’s voice slides into Kylo’s awareness while he’s staring out of the viewport as hyperspace streaks by; he’s been trying to stay out of the way through the trip but Vader keeps finding things he wishes to consult Kylo on--as if his opinion actually matters. 

Kylo stiffens and glances at Vader but if he is aware of Snoke’s communication he gives no indication. Not that Kylo can read him well, anyway. 

He thought Vader’s proximity was keeping Snoke silent. He thought his shields were growing stronger. But Snoke finds a way in. Or perhaps--and this is Kylo’s secret fear--he never leaves. Like mold flourishing in a dark corner, perhaps Kylo’s mind is never truly rid of him and is instead the perfect environment for Snoke’s words to infest. 

_ Lord Vader has been corrupted by sentimentality.  _ Snoke continues when Kylo remains silent.  _ He killed his master. The man who shared his knowledge with him--for something as trivial as shared blood. _

_ He would possess you for that same blood.  _

_ When has blood ever saved you?  _

_ Why would it start being something you long for now? _

Kylo has a monstrous headache by the time they drop out of hyperspace. 

The neutral planet is small, and dwarfed by the colossal ship already suspended above it.

_The_ _Supremacy_.

The First Order, the Fractured Faction, and the New Republic have settled into an uneasy cold war since the end of the Galactic Civil War.

He had heard rumors, of course. Of the horrors of the gang of Empire sympathizers that refers to itself as the First Order.  Kylo has no memory of when the war was hot or of when there weren’t factions of the former Empire. The rumors were bad enough; of child snatchers and brainwashing. He’s never known why the Empire split. What Kylo had heard was that both factions were run by two different but equally terrifying monsters. 

Kylo had wondered what made them monstrous. Every kid he knew growing up had been terrorized by tales of the fearsome Darth Vader--of his mechanical breathing, of his strange powers. Master Skywalker had forbidden such tales. 

And Kylo knew of Snoke first hand. Of the way he could worm into Kylo’s head and convince him of anything by poking at those weak spots that Kylo was ashamed of.

Two monsters and Kylo was caught between.

* * *

“They’re not on the planet.”

This is said by Kylo, softly but matter-of-fact. They are in the hanger bay now. Kylo will have to choose which shuttle he’s boarding. The one going to  _ The Supremacy _ or the one going planetside. 

“Who?”

“The students. Maybe they took a few but at least two are on Snoke’s ship.”

Vader paused. He had no illusions about Snoke’s awareness of Vader and his operatives docking on the ship. It would be foolishness to even entertain the idea that they could sneak on without his notice. But the hostages being planetside would have made Vader’s mission easier. 

It was entirely possible that some of Luke’s students had chosen to remain with the First Order, but would Kylo take Vader’s word? Did they have time to talk about it? 

No. Better to send Kylo to confront or rescue his peers himself. Vader could feel the conflict coming off of him about their objective anyway. Best to relieve him of the choice entirely.

“Could you locate them by Force sense?” He asked and Kylo nodded without hesitation. “That will be your objective, then.” 

“Yes, sir.” Kylo boarded Vader’s shuttle.

* * *

When they board  _ The Supremacy _ they are, of course, met with resistance.

It is nothing Vader hasn’t handled a thousand times prior.

It is a simple matter to break through  the defense--to cut down the First Order troopers in their mockery of Imperial trooper uniforms--and gain access to the ship at large.

He sends half his troops with Kylo and they part ways. Kylo taks a turbo lift up and Vader takes the next one down. 

He finds Snoke in a blood red room surrounded by eight guards in red armor--a poor attempt at Palpatine’s Imperial Guard, no doubt. But Vader had known the skill of those sentinels of a bygone age and these were unknown to him. Vader and his four troopers were outnumbered and then there was Snoke to contend with. 

“What an honor! The Internim Emperor in the flesh.”  Snoke leered at Vader. “Relatively speaking.”

Snoke was just as decrypt as every holo made him out to be, if smaller. He sat like a king atop a raised throne in loose fitting robes. Just looking as him made Vader’s ire rise. 

This man had tormented his family. Vader had killed Palpatine for Luke, he’d removed himself for Leia, he could take care of Snoke for Kylo. It was only right.

“I think you know why I am here.”

Snoke sneered. “So kind of you to bring him to me. I needn’t tell you how easy is is for the young to...go astray.”

“Kylo is not your concern,” Vader said, reaching for his lightsaber. 

“Kylo?” There was a mocking tone to Snoke’s voice that gave Vader pause. “Ah. I see he told you about the name he was to take on as my apprentice. He’s not so much yours as you’d like for him to be, Lord Vader. It is I who nurtured him thus far. And I who will craft him into a superior agent of darkness. Kylo Ren will surpass you in every way. Under my tutelage.”

There was a tightness in Vader’s chest at Snoke’s words. But now was not the time to examine it so he pushed it aside. 

Vader unclipped his saber from his belt. “You are a dithering fool. Blinded by the past. Fear not; I have foreseen your future.”

Snoke laughed. “And what might that be?”

“Allow me to show you.” Vader ignited his saber. The time for talk was over.

* * *

Kylo had been in firefights. He was by no means an expert in warfare but Han and Luke and Leia tended to find trouble and Kylo had always been a tag along with one or the other.

He had known how to shoot a blaster for as long as he could remember and Luke had taught him how to deflect bolts with a saber--which was a nifty trick when there weren’t allies near (as his saber swings tended to be on the wide side). So not so good in narrow corridors of  _ The Supremacy _ . 

Still, Kylo’s most useful trick for a firefight, he had taught himself on a sleepless night with the help of a certain daring droid. 

Luke had not been as excited as Kylo thought someone ought to be when witnessing a blaster bolt freeze in midair. But by the time Luke found out what Kylo and Artoo had done Kylo had already mastered the trick. 

He used it in the corridor of  _ The Supremacy _ outside the cell of his peers. The First Order troopers were so astounded they didn’t fire a second shot (which was good since he could only hold one at a time) and then they didn’t get a chance to, as the Imperial troopers with Kylo took them out.

Inside two teenages sat huddled together on a bench at the far side of the cell. Bat, a human of Kylo’s age and Roth, a  Mirialan a few years older. Both looked wan and exhausted but lit up with cautious excitement at the sight of a familiar face.

“Solo!” Bat sprang up from where he had been laying with his head in Roth’s lap. “Don’t tell me those bastard’s caught you too.” 

“Not yet,” Kylo said. “This is a rescue.”

“You need to get far away from here,” Roth said in his mild way. “It’s not safe.”

Kylo stamped down his irritation. Roth had that effect on him. “I get that. That’s why we’ve come for you.”

“We?”

Kylo gestured toward the troopers who were keeping an eye on the halway. “Imperial troopers.” He elaborated, in case the subtle differences in their armour design weren’t visible.

“You made it to Vader,” Roth breathed, clearly awed. 

“He’s dealing with Snoke,” Kylo told them.

“He’s here?” Bat’s eyes bugged. “Why didn’t you say so? Can’t keep a man like that waiting.” He turned to Roth, offering a hand. “You ready to get outta here?”

Roth reached for Bat’s hand, smiling. Kylo turned and left the cell, suddenly feeling like an intruder. 

The group rushed through the corridors of the Supremacy as subtly as possible.  But the ship was in disarray trying to find the intruders so their efforts were lost in the chaos. 

It turned out that the slight differences in the troopers armour was a good enough disguise, as the people they passed looked right over the group in their rush. So long as Roth kept his face hidden under his hood, at a passing glance it looked like the troopers were transporting prisoners. 

As they made their way back to the hanger Ben couldn’t help noticing that most of the crew they passed weren't much older than Bat, Roth, and himself. He wondered what these young people saw in Snoke’s regime that they hadn’t in Vader’s.

Snoke or Vader?

That was the choice placed before Kylo. He could wait in the hanger with the others and let it play out. Join whoever lived through it. 

But he had told Vader he wanted to make decisions for himself. That meant the difficult ones too.

Vader had protected him, offered him guidance and asked for his thoughts--instead of controlling what or how he thought. But Vader was family--apparently (part of Kylo still hoped it was some cruel joke). Could he live through trusting a member of his family again? His parents had abandoned him. His uncle had betrayed him. The truth was that Kylo wasn’t what they wanted him to be. Being unloved and hopeless was going to be the death of him if he didn’t make it end. 

And Snoke? How many times had Kylo listened to him decry the triviality of blood? He had always promised an end to Kylo’s turmoil. But Snoke’s form of teaching was torment. Snoke was a monster...but he was a monster that Kylo knew. There wouldn’t likely be a betrayal from Snoke. And if there was? So what? Such an event might kill him but it wouldn’t break him; Snoke wasn’t someone Kylo could love...

Kylo didn’t love Vader either. Not in a real way. Not like he had loved his mom and dad and uncle (not even the twisted way he loved them now). To Kylo, Vader was still partially the boogeyman invoked to scare children. Despite their shared blood. 

Vader had told Kylo that his love was a selfish one--a greedy, possessive emotion. It would have to be, Kylo supposed, seeped in the Dark as Vader was. Kylo wasn’t afraid of the Darkness. He hadn’t been before Luke raised a saber to him. 

Wasn’t that the problem?

Kylo’s love was acidic. That had been proven time and again, had it not? It clung and corroded--eating away all the soft, comforting pieces of the people he loved until there was hard bone and tough muscle and then nothing. 

And yet...

His mother had told him that hope was like the sun. And he is his mother’s son, for what it’s worth. 

He has the blisters to prove it. 

When they reached an turbolift Kylo saw the troopers and their cargo to the hanger bay and then continued the descent by himself. Towards the twin behemoth Force presences below.

* * *

The fight is brutal even by Vader’s standards. Snoke uses a lot of Force lighting and Vader--well, he’s never been great with Force lightning. His troopers are well trained though and they keep the red armoured guards out of his way.

Still, he knows he’s losing when the unthinkable happens and the turbolift door opens. His grandson walks into the red room, lightsaber in hand. 

Snoke intercepts him before the boy even has the chance to ignite the blade. His hold on Kylo keeps him immobile as he lifts him several feet off the ground. His face is slack and his eyes are twin pools of darkness. Caught, no doubt, in a lie of Snoke’s and being pulled steadily toward the monster. 

Rattled, Vader hesitates. That’s all Snoke needs to send a bought of Force lightning towards Vader so vicious that it sends him flying across the room.  

* * *

Kylo steps through the elevator doors into the red room beyond--

 

And woke up on the floor of his hut on Lothal. The night was loud with the chirping of insects and the rustling of long grass. For a moment Ben was disoriented, so he closed his eyes against it. Then he was sure it had all been a horrible dream. 

Luke would never betray him.  Luke would never give up on him.  His relationship with his parents was strained but not broken. He could mend it. It would take work. Maybe Luke would help.  Yes--he’d go to Luke in the morning. Nothing was as bad as Snoke made it out to be. It could be so much worse--

A noise close to Ben made him open his eyes. He knew what that roiling hum meant. His stomach dropped as he took in the hut, now bathed in a sickeningly green light. 

This was where instinct kicked in. When he shoved away the soul aching hurt of everything this moment meant and reacted. 

That’s how it had happened, after all.

This was the most helpless Ben had ever felt. On the floor, slow with sleep, with his trusted master poised over him with deadly intent. 

Beloved uncle.

Ben was vulnerable. 

Susceptible to suggestion.

Like the suggestion that no words could soothe the other students’ fury against him.

Like the one that said burn the evidence.

Burn the temple.

The suggestion that his mother would never believe him. His father would never forgive him. That they loved Luke more than they did him. That they had expected this.

Maybe they had.

Regardless, Ben had expectations of his own now.

This time when Ben turned to face Luke he didn’t call his own lightsaber. He didn’t collapse the hut. This time he probed Luke’s mind. When he met resistance he  _ pushed _ , imagining his intent for information an arrow piercing straight to the heart of the matter. 

And he saw. And he knew. 

Ben made a decision. He decided he wasn’t going to let this being manipulate him and his family ever again. 

Kylo reached for his lightsaber, which wasn’t on the table, but already in his hand, and plunged its red blade into Luke.

The hut dissolved.

 

Snoke made a noise of disbelief as he looked at the lightsaber impaled in his chest. Snoke’s hold on Kylo failed and they both tumbled to the reflective floor. Kylo beheaded the creature, for good measure. The extra violence felt good. The remaining guards in red had nearly overpowered Vader’s stormtroopers. 

Kylo let himself sink into the Force and the rest was a blur.

* * *

Vader has survived fire, electrocution, mutilation, two wars, and grief. Vader was cursed with survival. The look on Kylo’s face when he regains consciousness nearly killed him. Or maybe it was the damage sustained to his suit.  

A bright red ‘30% functionality and failing’ message lit up one of his viewports. The other must have been damaged because for the first time he could look upon his grandson (such a beautifully wretched boy), who was crying again. He was darker of hair and lighter of skin than Vader had imagined. He was also marred by a great red slash from chest to forehead. 

“Why the tears?” 

“I thought you were dead. I checked your wrist for a pulse; there wasn’t one.”

“There wouldn’t be,” Vader said struggling to sit upright.  “But I’m not dead yet.”

Kylo wasted no time jumping up to help; slipping Vader’s arm over his shoulders and supporting most of his weight.  The sensors were dead from his right knee down, Vader noted, making that leg mostly dead weight. 

“Yet?” Kylo asked as Vader took a moment to assess the situation. The guards in red were scattered about the room in heaps along with the troopers that had accompanied him. 

Snoke, his golden robe catching the light of a falling spark, lay headless.

It seemed that Kylo’s decision had been made.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter is the last for this installment but I am planning to continue the story. When I am ready to post part 2 I will link the two stories as a series. I have no idea when that will be. Ideally, I will have finished the first draft of that story before posting the first chapter.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter of part 1. Part 2 coming eventually.

There’s too much gas in the atmosphere on the planet Mustafar. The sky is always varying shades of grey--unless there’s an electrical storm.

Three days of observation from the tallest accessible position on Fortress Vader and that is Kylo’s conclusion regarding the planet: There’s too much gas in the atmosphere.

It isn’t that it’s hot or that it smells bad; it is and it does. But that’s not what bothers Kylo. It’s just, the planet is constantly in the middle of a gravitational tug-of-war between two gas giants--each vying to claim the lava planet for its moon--and yet, you can never see a sun.

Day and night are only distinguishable by their varying shades of grey. The surface of the planet is brighter than the sky but it’s an angry, bubbling thing. A false light. It makes Kylo nauseous to look at for too long. So he stays in the tower and looks to the sky.

Sometimes he’s joined by the other. Usually, he’s alone.

After they had made it safely back to _The Devastator_ from the mission on _The Supremacy_ they were rushed to medical. The medics there had taken over Vader’s wellbeing and Kylo had felt useless. Shi’ko had finally woken and was glad to see them. The four of them were boarded together in medical so they had plenty of time to catch each other up on the horrors of the last week...or not. Roth and Bat hadn’t wanted to talk about their time with Snoke, Shi had been in a coma for most of that time, and Kylo felt his conversations with Vader were private.

Instead they had rehashed that last night at Luke’s ad nauseum and talked about the current political turmoil between the First Order and the Empire (no longer fractured). Grand Marshal Sloane was set to oversee the remainder of the siege of First Order assets and personnel in Vader’s absence.  

Before long they are shuffled to Vader’s fortress on Mustafar (cleverly named Fortress Vader). Kylo has yet to see Vader since the siege. His grandfather was transported separately.  

Still, he feels Vader’s presence deep in the bowels of the fortress. He never tries to find him. Kylo doesn’t know what he’d do if he tried.

They all need time to transition, Kylo knows this. But these periods of adjustment have always caused him to be maudlin.

Kylo  watches as Shi’ko leans forward to rub at the area above her new leg. They are all sitting on the floor of the tower room. There are large bay windows on all four walls and no furniture.

“How’s the new leg?” Roth asks.

“Ya know, it’s strange,” Shi’ko starts. “They did all kinds of tests and measurements and calculations--even grew syntho skin to match--so that it’s exactly like the one I lost and it’s… heavy. I don’t know why. By all accounts it’s the same, but. It’s heavy.”

Ben wishes he could comfort her--them. He feels guilty for their loss but he hasn’t been able to bring himself to apologize. He says nothing. These three people were not his friends at Luke’s temple, but they weren’t the type to watch idly while someone was cut down. They are survivors and he owes them so much. What they have endured in the days following the temple is his fault.

“I was hoping they’d give you a wicked metal leg, Shi,” Bat says. “With like, a cloven hoof and-- ow!” Roth smacks Bat on the arm but Shi’ko is laughing.

“So,” she says after they’ve goofed off a bit. “The meds on _The Devastator_ gossip a lot.”

“So?” Ben asks at the same time Roth asks: “About what?”

“They say our host is going to take you on as an apprentice, Ben. Is that true?”

He hadn’t told them anything about his time with Lord Vader. Although Bat had been slathering for information those first few days. He certainly hadn’t gotten around to telling them Vader had changed his name. He didn’t want to ask these people, who had lost so much because of Ben, to start thinking of him as a new person. Perhaps if he felt like a new person it’d be different…

“I don’t know.” His answer makes Roth look anxious.

“Isn’t that what Snoke wanted too?” Shi’ko asks.

“Yeah,” Bat answers before Ben gets the chance. “He talked about you some.”

Ben doesn’t want to know what Snoke had said about him.

“Is it true?” Roth askes and Ben can’t place his feelings, neither by querying the Force nor from his neutral tone. He endeavors to be honest.

“I think so,” Ben says after taking a deep breath.

Shi’ko sighs and Bat cringes and Roth nods.

“I envy you that,” Roth says, causing the other three to look at him askance, to which he shrugs and asks “How does it feel, Solo?”

“How does what feel?”

“To be passed from one legend to the next. When Skywalker invited me to be his student I felt like I was soaring. It didn’t turn out so well, admittedly, but I’ll always remember that feeling. So how’s it feel?”

 _It feels heavy_. Kylo says nothing, just shrugs.

“Guess you’re used to it by now,” Roth says. “Legends for parents. Legends for masters. Must be nothing for you anymore.”

* * *

It feels like a small eternity before Vader is well enough to emerge from the bacta tank. He emerges feeling strangely better. Not just physically; the effects of the bacta on his body stopped being worth the time it took away from him long ago. But this time it gave him the space necessary to think.  

Not for the first time Vader wishes he had died on the second Death Star.

Or long ago. With Padme. If he had would his grandchild have been spared the ramifications of Darth Vader’s legacy? Could he have been overlooked by a being such as Snoke? Would he have been spared the suspicion of his family? Would the ramifications of Anakin Skywalker's fall--of his choices--affect his family still? Even now? Would it never end?

He’d been wrong. He’s known that for a long time. Now his choices had cost his grandchild; had tainted another generation of his family. Not just the abuse the boy had suffered from Snoke’s constant presence. But Vader’s abuse of the boy, as well.

It was that damned name that was vexing Vader again.

He could make him change his name for good. Pick something for himself. Vader was sure he could convince his grandson that it was the right thing to do. He could imagine telling him that the time of Ben and the time of Kylo was behind him now.

It was no good. Vader was being eaten by a memory. Another memory of a dead man relinquishing a name given by a mother, in love, for a name ordered by a master.

Perhaps Vader could get used to the name his daughter had given his grandson.

The castle is large and labyrinthine but Ben flares in the Force. Vader can feel the presences of the other students elsewhere. He still has to figure out what to do with those three. But that was an issue for another time.

It doesn’t take long to find Ben. He’s alone in one of the towers. The room he’s occupying is isolated from his peers and as far from the Sith cave at the base of the castle as the physical confines of Vader’s fortress will allow.  Windows on every wall filter in the natural low light of Mustafar, from the magma on the planet's surface. Still, the lighting is erratic--flickering and weak--so it takes Vader a moment to even spot Ben. Huddled, as he is on the floor. His knees drawn up to his chest and head pillowed on his crossed arms.

“I apologize,” Vader says by way of greeting. There is nowhere for him to sit, the room is bare, so he stands above his grandchild and tries to make amends.

Ben looks up from the cradle of hims arms. His eyes are the brightest thing in the room. The tint on Vader’s viewports make the wound on his face a jarring, bright red. It difficult to tell but he thinks Ben’s been crying.

“I should never have made you change your name, Ben. Too much was lost to you on that night for me to demand more.”

Ben looks away. “I never minded giving it up,” he says quietly. “It felt nice to be someone else, after.”

“Be that as it may, you are not someone else.”

“No,” he agrees quietly. “I’m not. Why the change of heart?”

“It is the name your mother chose for you.” Vader had taken enough from Leia.

“Mom never told me about you.” Ben said bitterly. “Why would she keep this from me?”

“Do not be unkind toward your mother on my behalf. She had good reason to keep her silence and she likely did it for your best interests.”

“How so?”

“She may have thought I’d mean you harm. I am the reason Luke is missing a hand, you know.” Vader hadn’t wanted to admit that much but he knows he must be honest. Ben deserves the truth from Vader, even if Vader is loathe to speak it. “And what I did to your mother doesn't leave physical scars. You’d do well to remember that.”

Ben frown. “Why?”

“I’d like to reassure you. I wish I could claim I was a different man back then. But I am still the same man. Older, certainly, and unfettered.”

“Unfettered?”

“Someone once did to me what Snoke was trying to do to you. I hope you never know the harm that monster meant for you.”

Ben was quite for a long moment. “My mom says hope is like the sun,” he mused at length, looking past Vader and out the window.  “If you only believe in it when you can see it then you’ll never survive the night.”

Vader swallowed thickly. His Leia had paid a high price for wisdom. “I like that.”

“It’s my favorite, I’d think of it on the worse nights with Snoke. I’d hope that is would all just stop... and now it has.”

“So it has. What do you hope for now?”

Ben buries his face in his crossed arms. “I hope she can forgive me,” he said, voice muffled. He was crying again, Vader felt his own eyes prickle.

His bright boy was gone.  

He didn’t blame Ben for that, but for once he found he had hopes of his own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Star Wars specific [ Twitter ](https://twitter.com/disorientedscrb)
> 
> My Star Wars specific [ Tumblr ](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/a-herd-of-nerf)


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